It was one of those days unique to London;
a cold, dank day when ennui filled the air and the fog was so
thick it seemed one could jump out the window and be wafted to
the ground as if on a feather pillow.

"Remember when I jumped out the window
expecting to be wafted to the ground as if on a feather pillow,
Blancmange?" said Colonel Broadbeam, late of the Royal Horse
Marine and biographer of Inspector Blancmange.

"Yes, my dear fellow. As I recall you
were in traction for six months. I must write a monograph on
that episode!"

"How do you do it, Blancmange?"
Broadbeam asked, with understandable admiration.

"Well, for one thing, I'm not brain damaged
from jumping out of windows" Blancmange thought, but chose
not to express aloud. "I suspect that for someone to venture
out in this beastly weather they must be sorely in need of our
services!"

Once again the Great Detective was correct.
When Broadbeam answered the door, standing in the hallway was
none other than young Sir Charles Blunderville, son of the late
Lord Bevis Blunderville.

"Come in, Sir Charles, and warm yourself
by the fire!" said Blancmange, "I trust you're here
to seek my help in solving the brutal murder of your father!"

"You must be able to read minds, Inspector!"
said Blunderville. "Or is it because of the unusual circumstances
of his death that have been so recently sensationalized in the
tabloids?"

"You must admit, my dear Sir Charles,
it's not every day that a man meets his end in such a way. It
took quite a sensational demise to move Jack the Ripper off the
front page of the Times!"

"I would not have believed it myself,
had I not seen the results with my own eyes. You see, Blunderville
Hall, our ancestral home, is situated in the Macken Mire, a bleak
and godforsaken place on the Brackish Moors. When one spends
his life in a place such as that, one sees many strange things.
Things beyond the ken of mortal man, indeed, things no doubt
beyond the ken of a merciful Heaven! But this episode was bizarre
even by the standards of that profane and wicked place!"

"I say!" said Broadbeam.

"Yes, so I can say it would appear to
be true, gentlemen, just as was reported in the popular press!
My father was pecked to death by a huge, demonic chicken!"

"I say!" said Broadbeam.

Blancmange lit his pipe. "Surely a man
of science such as yourself doesn't believe in such things! I've
read your works on tuba playing among the Hottentot, and your
paper on dementia in kelp is something of a classic! So, then,
Sir Charles, why do you seek our services? Surely not to trap
this hellish fowl."

"No, Inspector. Unlike the simple folk
who live on the moors, I have no superstitious belief in ghosts,
wraiths, banshees, demonic chickens or the glowing hedgehog that's
said to make its appearance every Guy Fawkes Day. No, I know
my father was murdered, and it was not by any supernatural livestock!
The chicken was merely the instrument of his demise, manipulated
by some Svengali for reasons unknown. But, there's more, Inspector
Blancmange! Since his death at the hands, er, beak of the chicken,
strange things have been happening at Blunderville Hall!"

"So it does, Blancmange! I'll wager that
one could jump out the window and be wafted to the ground as
if on a feather pillow!" He proceeded to put his theory
to the test, with predictable results.

"Well, Sir Charles, now that that's out
of the way, tell me about these curious events."

"As I was saying, strange things have
occurred beyond my father's death. First, Puckish, my manservant,
was found in the oven, trussed up and stuffed with bread crumbs!
That very night, my favorite boots, which I'd left out on the
sidewalk to be blacked, disappeared! Then, as a final straw,
someone replaced my regular coffee with Folger's Crystals!"

"This is curious, indeed! I think a trip
to Blunderville Hall is called for! We shall leave on the noon
train from Paddington Station. We must get to the bottom of this
before this poultry manipulating fiend strikes again!"

You can't imagine how grateful I am, Inspector!

"I say!" said Broadbeam, entering
the room disheveled but none the worse for his adventure. "Luckily,
a street urchin broke my fall. Oh, well, plenty more where HE
came from, eh?"